Friam

The Case for a Scientific Education

Classic

List

Threaded

4 messages Options

Robert Holmes

The Case for a Scientific Education

Let's leave it to C.P. Snow:

A good many times I have been present at gatherings of people who, by the standards of the traditional culture, are thought highly educated and who have with considerable gusto been expressing their incredulity at the illiteracy of scientists. Once or twice I have been provoked and have asked the company how many of them could describe the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The response was cold: it was also negative. Yet I was asking something which is the scientific equivalent of: Have you read a work of Shakespeare's?

I now believe that if I had asked an even simpler question — such as, What do you mean by mass, or acceleration, which is the scientific equivalent of saying, Can you read? — not more than one in ten of the highly educated would have felt that I was speaking the same language. So the great edifice of modern physics goes up, and the majority of the cleverest people in the western world have about as much insight into it as their neolithic ancestors would have had.

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

lrudolph

Google Search, The Case for a Scientific Education, and Google Cars

"At the time I said I was reminded of what the critic
John Simon had said about CP Snow: 'He sees two cultures
where I see barely one.'" (Raymond Sokolov, _Why We Eat
What We Eat: How Columbus Changed the Way the World
Eats_, thanks to Google Books)

I remember the quotation attributed to Simon somewhat
differently (where Sokolov quotes "see", I remember
"can discern"), and now that I have a pointer to Simon
I'll continue looking for the horse's-mouth version;
but at last Google now has it (I've searched for it on
Google every few months, as long as there's been a
Google to search for it on, and otherwise longer than
that, including on many newsgroups and mailing lists).

Meanwhile, what do all you-all think about the Google
Car (the autonomous urban transporter, not the Google
Street View snooper),
<http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/10/science/10google.html?>?
It's very interesting (to me) that, at least in the Times
article, although Sebastian Thrun naturally is featured
largely, somehow the phrase "Willow Garage" never appears.
Maybe Google *is* evil, hmm?

Lee Rudolph

> Let's leave it to C.P. Snow <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Two_Cultures>:
>
> A good many times I have been present at gatherings of people who, by the
> standards of the traditional culture, are thought highly educated and who
> have with considerable gusto been expressing their incredulity at the
> illiteracy of scientists. Once or twice I have been provoked and have asked
> the company how many of them could describe the Second Law of
> Thermodynamics. The response was cold: it was also negative. Yet I was
> asking something which is the scientific equivalent of: *Have you read a
> work of Shakespeare's?*
>
> I now believe that if I had asked an even simpler question - such as, What
> do you mean by mass, or acceleration, which is the scientific equivalent of
> saying, *Can you read?* - not more than one in ten of the highly educated
> would have felt that I was speaking the same language. So the great edifice
> of modern physics goes up, and the majority of the cleverest people in
> the western world have about as much insight into it as
> their neolithic ancestors would have had.
>

Shawn Barr

Re: Google Search, The Case for a Scientific Education, and Google Cars

Lee,

A similar quote appears in a "The Theater Critic and His Double" by John Simon in the _Hudson Review_:

"Thus he sees, apparently, two Edmund Wilsons where there is only one admittedly large one, two cultures where one wonders whether there is even one, and a whole wit in George Steiner."

which could be

"Thus he sees . . . two cultures where one wonders whether there is even one . . . ."

http://www.jstor.org/stable/3848465

Other than that I didn't find anything on Google.

Yet, I'm curious why the "can discern" version is worth 10+ years of searching.

Best,
Shawn

On Thu, Oct 14, 2010 at 3:26 PM, <[hidden email]> wrote:

"At the time I said I was reminded of what the critic
John Simon had said about CP Snow: 'He sees two cultures
where I see barely one.'" (Raymond Sokolov, _Why We Eat
What We Eat: How Columbus Changed the Way the World
Eats_, thanks to Google Books)

I remember the quotation attributed to Simon somewhat
differently (where Sokolov quotes "see", I remember
"can discern"), and now that I have a pointer to Simon
I'll continue looking for the horse's-mouth version;
but at last Google now has it (I've searched for it on
Google every few months, as long as there's been a
Google to search for it on, and otherwise longer than
that, including on many newsgroups and mailing lists).

Meanwhile, what do all you-all think about the Google
Car (the autonomous urban transporter, not the Google
Street View snooper),
<http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/10/science/10google.html?>?
It's very interesting (to me) that, at least in the Times
article, although Sebastian Thrun naturally is featured
largely, somehow the phrase "Willow Garage" never appears.
Maybe Google *is* evil, hmm?

Lee Rudolph

> Let's leave it to C.P. Snow <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Two_Cultures>:
>
> A good many times I have been present at gatherings of people who, by the
> standards of the traditional culture, are thought highly educated and who
> have with considerable gusto been expressing their incredulity at the
> illiteracy of scientists. Once or twice I have been provoked and have asked
> the company how many of them could describe the Second Law of
> Thermodynamics. The response was cold: it was also negative. Yet I was
> asking something which is the scientific equivalent of: *Have you read a
> work of Shakespeare's?*
>
> I now believe that if I had asked an even simpler question - such as, What
> do you mean by mass, or acceleration, which is the scientific equivalent of
> saying, *Can you read?* - not more than one in ten of the highly educated
> would have felt that I was speaking the same language. So the great edifice
> of modern physics goes up, and the majority of the cleverest people in
> the western world have about as much insight into it as
> their neolithic ancestors would have had.
>

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

lrudolph-2

Re: Google Search, The Case for a Scientific Education, and Google Cars

In reply to this post by lrudolph

Shawn,

Thank you! This must have been what I was misremembering.

>
> Lee,
>
> A similar quote appears in a "The Theater Critic and His Double" by John Simon in the _Hudson
> Review_:
>
> "Thus he sees, apparently, two Edmund Wilsons where there is only one admittedly large one,
> two cultures where one wonders whether there is even one, and a whole wit in George Steiner."
>
> which could be
>
> "Thus he sees . . . two cultures where one wonders whether there is even one . . . ."
>
> http://www.jstor.org/stable/3848465
>
> Other than that I didn't find anything on Google.
>
> Yet, I'm curious why the "can discern" version is worth 10+ years of searching.

Because I remember it so clearly (and, apparently, so
falsely). It's always good to find out that one has
been very wrong for very long, isn't it? (Though I
would have prefered to find out that I had been right,
I guess.)

Cheers,

Lee

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org